seemed less to present a sharper reality than to offer a glimpse of an ideal world.

There his tarnished virginity was soon blackened out of recognition; but so
There his tarnished virginity was soon blackened out of recognition; but so. That he could not understand why I was not married. I can-not believe that the truth is so. the Burmah cheroot that accom-panied it a pleasant surprise; and these two men still lived in a world where strangers of intelligence shared a common landscape of knowledge. as nubile a little creature as Lyme could boast. ??My dear Miss Woodruff . it is because I am writing in (just as I have assumed some of the vocabulary and ??voice?? of) a convention universally accepted at the time of my story: that the novelist stands next to God. therefore I am happy. To the west somber gray cliffs. In the winter (winter also of the fourth great cholera onslaught on Victori-an Britain) of that previous year Mrs. and dreadful heresies drifted across the poor fellow??s brain?? would it not be more fun. a rich warmth. took the same course; but only one or two.??He left a silence. He found a pretty fragment of fossil scallop. propped herself up in bed and once more turned to the page with the sprig of jasmine. One day she came to the passage Lama. These last hundred years or more the commonest animal on its shores has been man??wielding a geologist??s hammer.??I must go. especially when the first beds of flint began to erupt from the dog??s mercury and arum that carpeted the ground. wild-voiced beneath the air??s blue peace. Tranter??s com-mentary??places of residence.This admirable objectivity may seem to bear remarkably little relation to his own behavior earlier that day. that I had let a spar that might have saved me drift out of reach.

????Let it remain so. In all except his origins he was impeccably a gentleman; and he had married discreetly above him. ??I must insist on knowing of what I am accused. But then he saw that Ernestina??s head was bowed and that her knuckles were drained white by the force with which she was gripping the table. but did not turn.??The sun??s rays had disappeared after their one brief illumi-nation. By circumstances. By not exhibiting your shame. invested shrewdly in railway stock and un-shrewdly at the gambling-tables (he went to Almack??s rather than to the Almighty for consolation). published between 1830 and 1833??and so coinciding very nicely with reform elsewhere?? had burled it back millions. a respectable place. perhaps not untinged with shame. which he covered with a smile. in her life. ??I prefer to walk alone.????Never mind. But a message awaited me. Ahead moved the black and now bonneted figure of the girl; she walked not quickly..??I am weak.?? And all the more peremptory.?? She paused. He had fine black hair over very blue eyes and a fresh complexion. ma??m.

But you must remember that at the time of which I write few had even heard of Lyell??s masterwork. Poulteney. Charles??s distinguishing trait. Before. where a line of flat stones inserted sideways into the wall served as rough steps down to a lower walk. whence she would return to Lyme. more quietly. seemingly across a plain. Poulteney highly; and it slyly and permanently??perhaps af-ter all Sarah really was something of a skilled cardinal?? reminded the ogress. had cried endlessly. who continued to give the figure above a dooming stare. the countryside around Lyme abounds in walks; and few of them do not give a view of the sea. the worndown backs of her shoes; and also the red sheen in her dark hair. of marrying shame. and saw on the beach some way to his right the square black silhouettes of the bathing-machines from which the nereids emerged. Thirteen??unfolding of Sarah??s true state of mind) to tell all??or all that matters. of which The Edinburgh Review. I think he was a little like the lizard that changes color with its surround-ings. the other charms. no education. He winked again; and then he went.. where the tunnel of ivy ended. He walked for a mile or more.

The programme was unrelievedly religious. It was a kind of suicide. had life so fallen out. with the permission and advice to proffer a blossom or two of his own to the young lady so hostile to soot. Poulteney and advised Sarah to take the post. Some half-hour after he had called on Aunt Tranter. Dulce est desipere. in this localized sense of the word.Sam??s had not been the only dark face in Lyme that morn-ing. as judges like judging. and gentle-men with cigars in their mouths. she would more often turn that way and end by standing where Charles had first seen her; there. But you must surely realize that any greater intimacy . had fainted twice within the last week.??She has relatives?????I understand not. a pigherd or two. Poulteney??s birthday Sarah presented her with an antimacassar??not that any chair Mrs. If she went down Cockmoil she would most often turn into the parish church.. I am hardly human any more. Speaker.?? She began to defoliate the milkwort. In fact. the country was charming.

Poulteney might pon-derously have overlooked that. spoiled child. but from some accident or other always got drunk on Sundays. on the open rafters above. Poulteney had made several more attempts to extract both the details of the sin and the present degree of repen-tance for it.??This indeed was his plan: to be sympathetic to Sarah. Poulteney. though with a tendency to a certain grandiose exaggeration of one or two of Charles??s physical mannerisms that he thought particularly gentlemanly.She took her hand away.????The first thing I admired in him was his courage. of course.??Her only answer was to shake her head.????It seemed to me that it gave me strength and courage . I am hardly human any more. Neat lines were drawn already through two months; some ninety num-bers remained; and now Ernestina took the ivory-topped pencil from the top of the diary and struck through March 26th. to put it into the dialogue of their Cockney characters. She saw that there was suffering; and she prayed that it would end. as if that was the listener. a kind of Mayfair equivalent of Mrs. . Above them and beyond.??????From what you said??????This book is about the living. And my false love will weep for me after I??m gone. miss.

It was dark. She was a plow-man??s daughter. she dictated a letter. and quotations from the Bible the angry raging teeth; but no less dour and relentless a battle. But he did not; he gratuitously turned and went down to the Dairy. an independence of spirit; there was also a silent contradiction of any sympathy; a determination to be what she was. Like many insulated Victorian dowagers.????Mrs.Now Ernestina had seen the mistake of her rivals: that no wife thrown at Charles??s head would ever touch his heart. Twelve ewes and rather more lambs stood nervously in mid-street. raised its stern head.All would be well when she was truly his; in his bed and in his bank . even some letters that came ad-dressed to him after his death . There his tarnished virginity was soon blackened out of recognition; but so. I know that by now I should be truly dead . for he had noticed some-thing that had escaped almost everyone else in Lyme. staring out to sea. as Ernestina. At first meetings she could cast down her eyes very prettily. but could not raise her to the next. You imagine perhaps that she would have swollen. For the first time she did not look through him. Once there she had seen to it that she was left alone with Charles; and no sooner had the door shut on her aunt??s back than she burst into tears (without the usual preliminary self-accusations) and threw herself into his arms. which strikes Charles a glancing blow on the shoulder and lands on the floor behind the sofa.

I can??t hide that. sloping ledge of grass some five feet beneath the level of the plateau. It pleased Mrs.??I am told. Mr. it was a timid look. The long-departed Mr. ??I fear I don??t explain myself well. He would mock me. at times. after a suitably solemn pause. published between 1830 and 1833??and so coinciding very nicely with reform elsewhere?? had burled it back millions. too occupied in disengaging her coat from a recalcitrant bramble to hear Charles??s turf-silenced approach.??He found her meekness almost as disconcerting as her pride. In places the ivy was dense??growing up the cliff face and the branches of the nearest trees indiscriminately. Charles??s distinguishing trait. misery??slow-welling. I can??t hide that. in carnal possession of a naked girl.. ??I interrupted your story. ma??m. They did not need to. and where Millie had now been put to bed.

which meant that Sarah had to be seen. There is only one good definition of God: the freedom that allows other freedoms to exist. He may not know all. with her hair loose; and she was staring out to sea. Poulteney sat in need-ed such protection. ??You shall not have a drop of tea until you have accounted for every moment of your day.But Mary had in a sense won the exchange. I didn?? ask??un. He saw the scene she had not detailed: her giving herself. since Mrs. Or was. and by most fashionable women.????But is not the deprivation you describe one we all share in our different ways??? She shook her head with a surprising vehemence.??Her only answer was to shake her head.??*[* Omphalos: an attempt to untie the geological knot is now forgot-ten; which is a pity. On the contrary??I swore to him that. Voltaire drove me out of Rome. I may add.??I should like Mr.]So I should not have been too inclined to laugh that day when Charles. she did. her way of indicating that a subject had been pronounced on by her. for amusement: as skilled furniture makers enjoy making furniture. who continued to give the figure above a dooming stare.

I think she will be truly saved. Miss Tina. Standing in the center of the road. as if. And I know how bored you are by anything that has happened in the last ninety million years. an infuriated black swan. sinking back gratefully into that masculine.. orange-tips and green-veined whites we have lately found incompatible with high agricultural profit and so poisoned almost to extinction; they had danced with Charles all along his way past the Dairy and through the woods; and now one. His eyes are still closed. He kept Sam. she dictated a letter. the face for 1867. you haven??t been beheading poor innocent rocks?? but dallying with the wood nymphs. and beyond them deep green drifts of bluebell leaves. But fortunately she had a very proper respect for convention; and she shared withCharles??it had not been the least part of the first attraction between them??a sense of self-irony. the approval of his fellows in society.??Mrs.. not a man in a garden??I can follow her where I like? But possibility is not permissibility. Since they were holding hands. He walked after her then along the top of the bluff. Plucking a little spray of milkwort from the bank beside her. a passionate Portuguese marquesa.

This woman went into deep mourning. Tranter. But Sarah was as sensitive as a sea anemone on the matter; however obliquely Mrs. Smithson.????Does she come this way often?????Often enough. to visual images. as not infrequently happens in a late English afternoon. ??No. controlled and clear. ma??m.. ??They have indeed. The wind moved them. even when they threw books of poetry. ??rose his hibrows?? and turned his back. alas. one of the impertinent little flat ??pork-pie?? hats with a delicate tuft of egret plumes at the side??a millinery style that the resident ladies of Lyme would not dare to wear for at least another year; while the taller man. har-bingers of his passage. as if she might faint should any gentleman dare to address her.In that year (1851) there were some 8. and more frequently lost than won.??Sam flashed an indignant look. He still stood parting the ivy. Strange as it may seem.

Since birth her slightest cough would bring doctors; since puberty her slightest whim sum-moned decorators and dressmakers; and always her slightest frown caused her mama and papa secret hours of self-recrimination. glistening look.??I am weak. That he had expecta-tions of recovering the patrimony he and his brother had lost. It seemed to me then as if I threw myself off a precipice or plunged a knife into my heart. Not the dead. up the general slope of the land and through a vast grove of ivyclad ash trees. an intensity of feeling that in part denied her last sentence. And yet in a way he understood. and was pretending to snip off some of the dead blooms of the heavily scented plant. He had never been able to pass such shops without stopping and staring in the windows; criticizing or admiring them. And Captain Talbot was called away on duty soon after he first came. But I now come to the sad consequences of my story. But she was no more able to shift her doting parents?? fixed idea than a baby to pull down a moun-tain. But the doctor was unforthcoming. a weak pope; though for nobler ends. in some blazing Mediterranean spring not only for the Mediterranean spring itself. and forgave Charles everything for such a labor of Hercules. If I had left that room.????Mrs. casual thought. tinkering with crab and lobster pots.She did not turn until he was close. dear girl.

so dutiful-wifely that he complained he was beginning to feel like a Turkish pasha??and unoriginally begged her to contra-dict him about something lest he forget theirs was to be a Christian marriage. No doubt you know more of it than I do. He was detected. Ernestina out of irritation with herself??for she had not meant to bring such a snub on Charles??s head. one of the strangest coastal landscapes in Southern England. that she awoke. A shrewd. ??You may return to Ken-sington. the towers and ramparts stretched as far as the eye could see . ??You look to sea. It took his mind off domestic affairs; it also allowed him to take an occasional woman into his bed. there was no sign. They knew they were like two grains of yeast in a sea of lethargic dough??two grains of salt in a vast tureen of insipid broth. Had you described that fruit. as if she could not bring herself to continue.????It seemed to me that it gave me strength and courage . springing from an occasion. his recent passage of arms with Ernestina??s father on the subject of Charles Darwin. Listen. but Sam did most of the talking. fingermarks. Poulteney had devoted some thought to the choice of passage; and had been sadly torn between Psalm 119 (??Blessed are the undefiled??) and Psalm 140 (??Deliver me. he would have lost his leg. She takes a little breath.

??You cannot. my knowing that I am truly not like other women. had she seen me there just as the old moon rose. and found herself as if faced with the muzzle of a cannon. ??A young person. Miss Woodruff. which did more harm than good. Poulteney felt only irritation. yet he tries to pretend that he does. Poul-teney discovered the perverse pleasures of seeming truly kind. No one will see us. No words were needed. Thus he had gained a reputation for aloofness and coldness. A schoolboy moment. as he hammered and bent and examined his way along the shore. and Charles. He stood at a loss. But he stood where he was. Indeed her mouth did something extraordinary.. I had no idea such places existed in England. he learned from the aunt. but they felt more free of each other. and used often by French seamen and merchants.

??He saw a second reason behind the gift of the tests; they would not have been found in one hour. and within a few feet one would have slithered helplessly over the edge of the bluff below.????I sees her. fragile. It was as if. conscious that she had presumed too much. It came to within a week of the time when he should take his leave. a better young woman. most deli-cate of English spring flowers. you hateful mutton-bone!?? A silence.. Their coming together was fraught with almost as many obstacles as if he had been an Eskimo and she. But as one day passed. which made them seem strong. in a very untypical way. Thus she appeared inescapably doomed to the one fate nature had so clearly spent many millions of years in evolving her to avoid: spinsterhood. I had no idea such places existed in England. so direct that he smiled: one of those smiles the smiler knows are weak. But perhaps there is something admirable in this dissociation between what is most comfortable and what is most recommended. it seemed. was the lieutenant of the vessel. the less the honor. Kneeling. with something of the abruptness of a disin-clined bather who hovers at the brink.

and in places where a man with a broken leg could shout all week and not be heard. and looked at it as if his lips might have left a sooty mark. She snatched it away. to have Charles. as at the concert. near Beaminster.Thus she had evolved a kind of private commandment?? those inaudible words were simply ??I must not????whenever the physical female implications of her body. Poulteney therefore found themselves being defended from the horror of seeing their menials one step nearer the vote by the leader of the party they abhorred on practically every other ground. A stunted thorn grew towards the back of its arena. for the medicine was cheap enough (in the form of Godfrey??s Cordial) to help all classes get through that black night of womankind??sipped it a good deal more frequently than Communion wine. but unnatural in welling from a desert. He should have taken a firmer line.?? he added for Mrs. You must not think she is like us men. bent in a childlike way. he stepped forward as soon as the wind allowed. Mr. Perhaps it was the gloom of so much Handel and Bach. but it spoke worlds; two strangers had recognized they shared a common enemy. which the arbiters of the best English male fashion had declared a shade vulgar??that is. so that she had to rely on other eyes for news of Sarah??s activities outside her house. then with the greatest pleasure. He did not always write once a week; and he had a sinister fondness for spending the afternoons at Winsyatt in the library. a look about the eyes.

You have the hump on a morning that would make a miser sing. and his uncle liked Charles. but unnatural in welling from a desert. mocking those two static bipeds far below. that he had drugged me . I un-derstand. then shot with the last rays of the setting sun. Per-haps what was said between us did not seem very real to me because of that. heavy eyebrows .?? The doctor took a fierce gulp of his toddy.??So the rarest flower. too tenuous. Such folk-costume relics of a much older England had become pic-turesque by 1867. ????Oh! Claud??the pain!?? ??Oh!Gertrude. onto the path through the woods. By circumstances.??That girl I dismissed??she has given you no further trou-ble???Mrs. Mrs.??But Sarah fell silent then and her head bowed. Without quite knowing why. pillboxes. or more discriminating. what wickedness!??She raised her head. Blind.

but endlessly long in process . Fursey-Harris to call. my dear Mrs. her husband came back from driving out his cows. Black Ven. selfish . questions he could not truthfully answer without moving into dangerous waters. flooded in upon Charles as Mrs. she would have had the girl back at the first. exquisitely grave and yet full of an inner. only the outward facts: that Sarah cried in the darkness. Tranter who made me aware of my error. He had touched exactly that same sore spot with his uncle. Most women of her period felt the same; so did most men; and it is no wonder that duty has become such a key concept in our understanding of the Victorian age??or for that mat-ter. She believes you are not happy in your present situation. corn-colored hair and delectably wide gray-blue eyes. Then perhaps . an element of pleasure; but now he detected a clear element of duty. she took advan-tage of one of the solicitous vicar??s visits and cautiously examined her conscience. he was not worthy of you. arched eyebrows were then the fashion. to haunt Ware Commons. demanded of a color was brilliance. as those made by the women who in the London of the time haunted the doorways round the Haymarket.

Fairley will give you your wages. Too much modesty must seem absurd . no mask; and above all. Below her mobile. But at least concede the impossibility of your demand. Poulteney. No one will see us. The relations of one??s dependents can become so very tiresome. But he had no luck. but her skin had a vigor. then came out with it.?? He stiffened inwardly. but she did not turn. Its sadness reproached; its very rare interventions in conversation?? invariably prompted by some previous question that had to be answered (the more intelligent frequent visitors soon learned to make their polite turns towards the companion-secretary clearly rhetorical in nature and intent)??had a disquietingly decisive character about them. his knowledge of a larger world. a small red moroc-co volume in her left hand and her right hand holding her fireshield (an object rather like a long-paddled Ping-Pong bat. But I must confess I don??t understand why you should seek to . he added a pleasant astringency to Lyme society; for when he was with you you felt he was always hovering a little. By not exhibiting your shame. not just those of the demi-monde. The John-Bull-like lady over there. and it was therefore a seemly place to walk. since he had a fine collection of all the wrong ones. Charles.

he saw a figure. But yet he felt the two tests in his pockets; some kind of hold she had on him; and a Charles in hiding from himself felt obscurely flattered. the sounds. Charles. for it remind-ed Ernestina. since he had moved commercially into central London. Butlers. more expectable item on Mrs. half intended for his absentmindedness. civilization. The dead man??s clothes still hung in his wardrobe.Charles stared down at her for a few hurtling moments.. And what goes on there. a lesson. So also. which Charles examined closely in profile. of course. not specialization; and even if you could prove to me that the latter would have been better for Charles the ungifted scien-tist.??That question were better not asked. with all her contempt for the provinces. Poulteney by the last butler but four: ??Madam. But this steepness in effect tilts it. of failing her.

??You will do nothing of the sort! That is blasphemy. should have found Mary so understand-ing is a mystery no lover will need explaining. mirrors?? conspire to increase my solitude. as if that might provide an answer to this enigma.But I have left the worst matter to the end. she could not bear to think of having to share. should have left earlier. who is reading. His flesh was torn from his hip to his knee. ??I think her name is Woodruff. but duty is peremptory and absolute. he added quickly.??She said nothing.??I owe you two apologies.????By heavens. for the day was beautiful. Poulteney. Poulteney??s nerves. too tenuous. did Ernestina. only to wake in the dawn to find the girl beside her??so meekly-gently did Millie. Most natural. It was rather an uncanny??uncanny in one who had never been to London. Without this and a sense of humor she would have been a horrid spoiled child; and it was surely the fact that she did often so apostrophize herself (??You horrid spoiled child??) that redeemed her.

????Why. Because you are not a wom-an. there were footsteps. and the woman who ladled the rich milk from a churn by the door into just what he had imagined. to have endless weeks of travel ahead of him.??Because you have traveled.??You have something .?? He paused. he glimpsed the white-ribboned bottoms of her pantalettes.Everything had become simple. who happened to be out on an errand; and hated him for doing it. and too excellent a common meeting place not to be sacrificed to that Great British God. the Undercliff. An exceed-ingly gloomy gray in color.For one terrible moment he thought he had stumbled on a corpse. Poulteney. But I??ve never had the least cause to??????My dear. She now went very rarely to the Cobb. I??ll show yer round.?? the doctor pointed into the shadows behind Charles . He stood. but pointed uncertainly in the direction of the conservatory. bounds. Sam??s love of the equine was not really very deep.

All this (and incidentally.?? ??The Illusions of Progress. She secretly pleased Mrs. her eyes still on her gravely reclined fiance.?? Charles put on a polite look of demurral. an intensity of feeling that in part denied her last sentence.However. March 30th.. Tranter??s on his way to the White Lion to explain that as soon as he had bathed and changed into decent clothes he would . You may search for days and not come on one; and a morning in which you find two or three is indeed a morning to remember. . a museum of objects created in the first fine rejection of all things decadent. she remained too banal.????And she wouldn??t leave!????Not an inch. as she pirouetted. as you so frequently asseverate. It still had nine hours to run. and seemed to hesi-tate. but it seemed to him less embarrassment than a kind of ardor. The day drew to a chilly close. Poulteney from the start. and making poetic judgments on them.The lady of the title is a sprightly French lord??s sprightly wife who has a crippling accident out hunting and devotes the rest of her excessively somber life to good works??more useful ones than Lady Cotton??s.

??I think it is better if I leave. She turned imme-diately to the back page. It was not in the least analytical or problem-solving. He regained the turf above and walked towards the path that led back into the woods.. been at all the face for Mrs. He was shrewd enough to realize that Ernestina had been taken by surprise; until the little disagree-ment she had perhaps been more in love with marriage than with her husband-to-be; now she had recognized the man. There too I can be put to proof. no less. He remembered?? he had talked briefly of paleontology. Ahead moved the black and now bonneted figure of the girl; she walked not quickly. to trace to any source in his past; but it unsettled him and haunted him. she gave the faintest smile. You may rest assured of that. Miss Woodruff is not insane. he had become blind: had not seen her for what she was. Sun and clouds rapidly succeeded each other in proper April fashion. Smithson.????Let it remain so. I cannot believe that he will be so easily put off. And slowly Charles realized that he was in temperament nearer to his grandfather than to either of his grandfather??s sons. . touching tale of pain. here they stop a mile or so short of it.

. The cottage walls have crumbled into ivied stumps. . She knew. They fill me with horror at myself.??If I can speak on your behalf to Mrs.??Is something wrong. It was dark. a crushing and unrelenting canopy of parental worry. Her father. Fairley. I know that by now I should be truly dead . how untragic. send him any interesting specimens of coal she came across in her scuttle; and later she told him she thought he was very lazy. Poulteney knew herself many lengths behind in that particular race for piety. You are not too fond. You never looked for her. or at least not mad in the way that was generally supposed. Its device was the only device: What is. But the way we go about it. considerable piles of fallen flint. I must give him.??If I can speak on your behalf to Mrs. Thus to Charles the openness of Sarah??s confession??both so open in itself and in the open sunlight?? seemed less to present a sharper reality than to offer a glimpse of an ideal world.